Barossa Village, SA - Nurse practitioner program
Aged Care Nursing Practitioner Program
How this program started
Five years ago, the now nursing practitioner recognised a gap in service provision related to clinical care of residents. The catalyst was when the wife of a resident mentioned how communication was becoming more difficult with her husband. On examination, his ears were found to be impacted with cerumen. The resident’s doctor was contacted about the problem and the doctor advised that he would be able to visit the resident in six weeks time. The nurse felt this response wasn’t adequate and began her quest to gain qualifications to become a nurse practitioner.
Aged Care Nurse Practitioner
With the full support of Barossa Village, the nurse chose to complete a Master of Nursing Practice in Aged Care, leading to authorisation with the Nurses Board of South Australia as the first Aged Care Nurse Practitioner in South Australia. A self directed project was initiated as part of the Master of Nursing Practice and led to the development of a website focussing on an evidence based literature review, investigating the incidence and management of depression as a comorbidity to Dementia. The nurse was nominated for and won a SA Department of Health Nursing Excellence Award in Research.
About the project
Through liaison with universities and the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing, it was identified there was a project planned to investigate Nurse practitioner-like services in residential aged care services. The Australian Government announced funding to pilot Aged Care Nurse Practitioner services to examine the introduction of the aged care nurse practitioner role in Australia. In April 2005, the Joanna Briggs Institute Research Unit was contracted to work with interested approved providers and ACT Health to assist them develop proposals within a framework that would facilitate a national evaluation and to conduct an external evaluation across all sites. Barossa Village became one of six national trial sites funded to participate in the trail from August 2005 for eleven months. Additional funding was secured and the trial continued until June 2007.
Resident benefits
The objective of the trial was to show the nursing practitioner role delivers equally as good quality in service delivery as provided by a medical practitioner in certain situations. Formalising this project explored the establishment and evaluation of the nursing practitioner role and defined the benefits for residents such as safety, quality, satisfaction, clinical care and outcomes.
Five stages of the trial
- Education, training and assessment of the nurse practitioner candidates
- Development of agreed clinical guidelines and protocols
- Establishment of nurse practitioner-like services
- Evaluation of nurse practitioner candidate services
- Development of report to the Australian Government
Since completion of the national trial, Barossa Village continues their commitment to sustain the nurse practitioner role as a dual Clinical Services Manager/ Nurse Practitioner. The role has expanded to include access for community and residential clients as well as the organisation continuing to fund the nurse practitioner medication imprest for emergency access to medications.
